-Steps to Ending Bad Eating Habits
Whether you're trying to break a snacking habit, consume too much sugar, or quit smoking, it all starts with knowing what you want and anticipating and overcoming hurdles. If you follow these six stages, you'll have an easier time achieving your objectives.
The client wrote, "Help me! I was finally getting a handle on my weight issue but sugar is killing me. I had a very bad day. I will never tell you what I ate today because it is unbelievable. All I can say is that 90% of my food today was sugary! "If I can get over this I will no doubt do it. I have achieved my goal."
If you see little about yourself in this message, you are not alone. Many describe themselves as sugar addicts.
They believe that if it were, for one thing, they could reach their goals of losing weight. If you believe that there is only one thing that stands in the way of your weight loss, consider this: What if that one thing (an example of sugar addiction) were no longer there?
Do you believe that "if I can get over this, I'll undoubtedly attain my goal," or do you see it as a convenient way to stay stuck?
If I told you I could show you how to stop craving sugar, would you like me to show you how?
Think about that for a moment. Close your eyes and think carefully. You once said that if you did not crave sugar, you could lose it, but is that true of you? Ask yourself these questions:
- You can eat differently, and if so how?
- You can do it differently, and if so how?
- What else would change, and what would it always be?
- What can you lose?
- What would you gain?
Until you know what you want, you know you can achieve it, and you know what else will change (i.e. how your life may be different), you will not find any obstacles to consider first. For example, you may want to stop eating anything after 7 PM but your husband does not come home from work until 8 and you want him to join you for dinner. That is an obstacle.
If you have a habit of watching your favorite TV show with an ice cream cone, breaking that habit is another obstacle.
If you don't find ways to overcome your obstacles either by negotiating and agreeing with your husband, or getting used to your ice cream habit, it will be a problem. Just saying you can't do something with any more doesn't usually work. Instead, decide what is best for you in achieving your goals, find the one that is closest to you, and have the potential to achieve those goals permanently.
The statement, "if this one thing were handled, everything else would happen" is an "If Anything" statement and puts people in trouble. They want a mythical goddess to make everything better. The strong belief that one thing such as, "eating sugar is my problem," puts you in a quandary, especially if you like eating sugary foods.
Finding the handle on your desires is not everything or anything. You should leave the deviation period from time to time. It is not the occasional side trip that causes the problem of weight, the road we usually travel.
In NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) a good start is a project called Creating a Well-Made Effect.
"Well-designed" means that it meets all the criteria for a well-thought-out result.
NLP: How to Create a Well-Made Outcome and Get What You Want
Here are the steps to create a well-designed effect:
- 1) Say what you want (not what you don't want). "I want to weigh 135 pounds."
- 2) Find out if you can do it (do you believe it is possible?).
- 3) What resources do you have and what do you need (time, money, gear, clothes, equipment, training, or anything).
- 4) Check to see if anyone else is involved and any obstacles that may arise. Think about all the people involved in your daily life.
- 5) Think of it as "as if" you have found what you are looking for and see if the image fits. Do you like what you see?
- 6) Merge the app to achieve your result.
While it may seem like a lot of effort to decide what you want, going through these steps will help you to identify potential barriers that prevent you from moving forward. For example, if you decide you want to join a gym and start exercising every day but you forget that you do not even have a car and you have just lost your job, that exercise program might not work right now. Once you join a gym, you end up not going and think you have failed, it is a failed strategy, not you. You did not think well.
The best plan for this is to exercise at home, or during a walking distance (or simply to go for a walk).
Later, if you have transportation, you can reconsider the plan and maybe join the gym right away. There are always options.
It’s best to look for what you want from all angles, and then assemble a program that you know can work and will work. Then when you know what you want, you will also know that you can make it happen and start by taking that first step to making it real.
"Achieving a Positive Outcome" is another session of the 8-Week Emergency Eating Workshop. You can also find more information about this popular and well-known NLP process by searching for the "Best NLP Effect" in your favorite search engine.